Nye’s Future of Power

In his new book The Future of Power, co-founder of neo-liberalism theory Joseph S. Nye outlines a synthesis of his more than two decades of scholarship on the future of world power politics. Nye explains how power works and how it is changing under the conditions of a burgeoning revolution in information technology, globalization, and the return of Asia in the 21st century. Based on an understanding of power and its changing landscape internationally, Nye endeavors to discredit the popular conception of a declining America despite the resurgence of China and India in the 21st century by suggesting that the United States should employ a smart power strategy that combines hard power and soft power to maintain its global leadership role.

Power is the ability to alter others’ behavior to produce preferred outcomes. It is not good or bad per se. Like calories in a diet, more is not always better. There are two major types of power in international relations: hard power and soft power. Hard power implies coercion while soft power allows us to obtain preferred outcomes through cooption. Hard power is push; soft power is pull. As we progress through the 21st century, Nye suggests that the utility of military force is declining; instead, soft power will play a larger role in international relations. Since attraction and persuasion are socially constructed, soft power is a dance that requires partners, which makes it difficult to wield and maintain. Sanctions combine both hard power and soft power. Because sanctions are the only relatively inexpensive policy option, they are likely to remain a major instrument of power in the 21st century despite their mixed record.

The two major trends of power shift in the 21st century are a power transition among states and a power diffusion away from all states to non-state actors. Nye predicts that the classical transition of power among great states may be less of a problem than the rise of non-state actors. In an information-based world of cyberinsecurity, power diffusion may be a greater threat than power transition. Conventional wisdom has always held that the state with the largest military prevails, but in an information age it may be the state (or non-states) with the most favorable presentation that wins.

In a century marked by global information and a diffusion of power to non-state actors, soft power will become an increasingly important part of smart power strategies. Nye warns that government efforts to project soft power will have to accept that power is less hierarchical in an information age and that social networks have become more important. Leaders need to think of themselves as being in a circle rather than atop a mountain.

Based on his analysis of how power works, Nye casts serious doubt that America is in precipitous decline and endeavors to dismiss this popular conception through a sober and rigorous analysis of the power resources the United States possesses and is able to possess through a smart power strategy. Becoming less dominant on the international stage is not a narrative of decline. The United States, he argues, needs a liberal realist strategy to cope with “the rise of the rest” among both states and non-state actors; that is, the United States needs to rediscover how to be a smart power. Furthermore, it is not enough to think in terms of power over others. We must also think in terms of power to accomplish goals that involves power with others. The problem of American power in the 21st century is not one of decline but of a failure to realize that even the largest country cannot achieve its goals of both national and international significance without the help of others.

With all due respect to the book for its clarity and depth, Nye does not explicitly explain the more fundamental goal of acquiring or maintaining power. Hard power, soft power, and smart power, which are explained in length and depth, are just tactics. The book’s title is The Future of Power, but the book is more tilted toward explaining power from the vantage point of the United States. Other governments in the world may see things differently, which the book does not adequately address. Otherwise, this book will make a good resource for teaching realism in international politics at the introductory and intermediate levels.

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We sniff out issues hiding in the foreign-policy forest and haul them back to the laboratory for inspection. We examine the anterior, posterior, and underside of an issue, as well as its shadows.

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